I (VanL) am nominating Jesse Noller to continue to sit on the board of directors. I have had
the opportunity to work with Jesse very closely for a couple of years now, and he has put in
extensive work to elevate the PSF and make it a better organization.

Just three things that Jesse has accomplished in the last year show his dedication to Python
and the PSF.

Established the Sprints Project and funded several worthwhile projects. This is the PSF
at its best - finding and serving Python-related projects to advance the language as a
whole. Not only did this get code committed for the benefit of Python generally, Jesse
also got the Python Sprints website launched (an endeavor in itself).

Served as Program Committee Chair (PyCon 2010) and Co-Chair (PyCon 2011). This is a lot
of work and is the PSF's biggest project from year to year. Jesse knows about how PyCon
works from the inside out, having established himself as a real contributor over several
years.

Acted as a mini-BDFL for PEP 3148, shepherding the Futures module through the PEP process
all the way to acceptance.

In addition, Jesse continues to work as a core committer, blogs about Python, works at a
Python Startup, and is always active defending and explaining Python on Reddit and Hacker
News.

I have served on the PSF board for two years, would like to continue to do so, and would be honored if the membership elects me again to do so.

Beginning prior to membership on the board, and on a continuing basis, I serve on the PSF Trademarks Committee, currently as its Chair. During this last year, I created the voting procedure now in use for the PSF (and the small software tools needed to make it work) and assisted PSF Secretary Pat Campbell in its operation. In general, I have assisted with the administravia of Board operation, including acting as Chair in one meeting where our esteemed Mr. Holden was unable to, taking and publishing minutes in another case, and have sheparded a few of the funding requests that have been requested of the Board.

By background, I am a recovering humanities academic, tempted away from post-structuralist political philosophy by the intrigue and wiles of algorithms and data structures (always best expressed in this language Guido gave us).

I am the author of Addison Wesley's Text Processing in Python, of the IBM developerWorks' column Charming Python (since 2001), and of various other articles advancing and explaining the use of Python and its tools and libraries. I have created some moderately well-used FOSS Python tools (most collected in Gnosis Utilities). Sometimes speaker at PyCon and OSCON. I have been an advocate for use of Python by several public-interest software projects, including in the voting software developed by the Open Voting Consortium (I was CTO and board member of that organization). I also have been a consultant with a number of notable Python-using organizations, at the margins helping to expand that use.

I have served on the Board for one year, and would be honored to continue if the members elect me for a second year.

I'm the Ubuntu Technical Architect, and in that role I'm working with Barry Warsaw and Matthias Klose to plan and drive Ubuntu's migration to Python 3. I'm one of the primary developers of a proof-of-concept Python 3 implementation on the Parrot VM called Pynie, and for that work was granted committer access to CPython (on Guido's recommendation). I bring a diverse perspective and experience in open source foundations, for the past nine years I've been on the board of one-foundation-or-another every year, and since 2005 have co-lead the FLOSS Foundations group for cross-foundation collaboration together with Dave Neary.

In my first year on the Board I learned a great deal about the inner workings of the PSF, participating in the usual day-to-day operations of the Board and higher-level strategic discussions. If elected, I plan to serve in a more active way this year, most likely in the area of improving the foundation's responsiveness to and management of grants and grant applications. I will have more time for the PSF this year, as I have stepped down from my position as chairman of the Parrot Foundation.

I've been working with Python since 1993/4 and on Python since 1997 as core developer. Many of you may know my company eGenix.com and the mx* extensions (mxDateTime, mxTextTools, mxODBC, etc.). As Python core developer I designed the Unicode integration, the codecs subsystem, wrote the platform module and helped with lots of details that I found useful during my consulting work over the years.

From 2002-2004 I already served on the PSF board and was PSF vice president in 2003/2004. Back then I got the Public Support Committee (PSC) off the ground with the aim of finding ways to generate income for the PSF and initiated the work on getting Python contributor agreements in place.

Last year, Steve Holden asked me to candidate for the PSF board again and I accepted.

Here's my 2010 agenda, which is still valid:

organizing fund raising in a professional way

starting with some real PR work for Python

getting a web firm to give the python.org site a face-lift, make it more attractive for users (pupils, students, novices, developers, educational institutions, governments and businesses), donors and the press

giving the PSF a face at various important IT- conferences by sending delegates there to give talks, setup and run a booth, etc.

establishing the PSF as lobby organization in the political sphere in order to participate in projects where Python and its mindset can help, e.g. open-source, scientific and educational projects

establishing and running services for the community, such as those needed for running small- to medium-sized conferences or meetings

I hope to add a more a business-like mindset to the PSF board, in order to enable the PSF to mature both in terms of figures and responsibility.

During my year on the board, I carried on the work started by Steve to setup a budget for the PSF to work with. This was completed for 2010 with the help of Steve, Doug Napoleone and Kurt Kaiser. It made working with grants and spendings in general a lot easier for the board. We are currently working on setting up the budget plan for 2011.

I also kicked off two new PSF projects: one to create a professional quality marketing brochure for Python which will help us get Python known outside the developer community and another one to make PyPI both more performant and reliable by pushing most of the content onto a content delivery network in an automated way.

Both projects are run by small teams and working steadily towards reaching their respective goals. Please see my monthly reports on them for details.

I'd like to continue with the work started in 2010 and look forward to another year serving on the board.

I am a freelance Python developer in NYC, graduating from CUNY with a CS/MATH degree many years ago. I've been using Python since 2000, blogging and writing articles about it's ease of use and rich feature set every chance I get, and using it on all of my start-up work. I have successfully designed and developed products for four different start-ups, using this code in production today. I'm working on two new Python based start-ups this year.

I run an apprenticeship in NYC, catering to people who have no formal Computer Science training. We do a lot more than Python, since we delve into material covering algorithms, OS conventions, shell programming, functional programming, pointers and addressing, etc. So far three people have found full-time employment as Python developers after investing an average of six months in the apprenticeship.

I am currently in the process of planning a NYC Python mini-conference (if such a thing can be small in NYC), hopefully for the Fall of this year, called PyGotham. This Python conference will be a proving ground for some new services to increase diversity at our conferences, such as child care, disabled assistance and access maps/routes, assistance for the blind and deaf, fun contests for older children, and an outreach day for local minors in need who wish to learn about anything computer related. I want to try the approach of funding these services as part of the whole, instead of finding special funding for these services individually. If we integrate it into our planning as just another service, not something unusual or special, it seems easier to fund and execute.

I hope to to be re-elected to the board. I spent this year respectfully listening and learning, interjecting here and there, contributing small bits where appropriate. I feel as if next year, I can truly contribute and hopefully move some existing conventions and policies in positive directions.